BRM Reviews Evolve 12: Fox vs. Callihan (awesome!)

[Big Red Machine]

Evolve 12: Fox vs. Callihan (5/11/2012)- Charlotte, NC


ADAM PAGE(0-1) vs. JAKE MANNING(0-0) vs. KALEB CONLEY(1-1) (w/Johnny Fairplay & Amanda)- 6/10
Johnny Fairplay and Amanda (the random chick for this evening) are replacements for Larry Dallas, who isn’t here for some reason.
Fine action in a relatively short match. Manning got the win, which felt important to justifying his presence here, as he has previously felt like pretty much just someone who was here as a favor to Chuck Taylor, when EVOLVE has no real reason to be wanting to do favors for, especially when the guy Chuck wanted brought in is a part of Chuck’s stable whose goal is “to make a mockery” of EVOLVE.

SHOOT FIGHT FROM CAGE WARS XII: Bobby Fish vs. Max Mayhem- no rating, bad idea
Fish won with a chairshot. Just kidding. He won via knockout. I guess the idea here was to make Fish look legit) which he is. I appreciated that they never said that this was “real” or “a shoot” or any other such term, but it still puts the idea in our heads.

ALEX REYNOLDS(1-0) vs. MIKE CRUZ(0-0)- 5.75/10
Decent back-and-forth stuff. Reynolds goes to 2-0. Announcer Lenny Leonard touted him as a top prospect.

LOW KI(2-0) vs. JIGSAW(1-0)- 8/10
Lenny Leonard pointed out that Low Ki is coming out to his own theme instead of the normal EVOLVE theme. I will admit that I had completely missed that fact.
There was a lot of great mat wrestling and striking here, with Low Ki very much being arrogant heel Low Ki, who fits wonderfully into the EVOLVE in environment, and Jigsaw being the underdog babyface who has to fight back against this onslaught. They had this absolutely wonderful moment where, after Jigsaw’s comeback started to get rolling, Ki just took out his knee with a dropkick as Jigsaw was going for a superkick, and in that moment you could feel the gear change and you the finish was coming soon.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good
Low Ki continued of streak of “controversial” (mostly really just douchy) statements, asking Jigsaw when he would “stop pretending to be a Luchador and start being a real professional wrestler.” He also said that he was tired of youngsters “thinking this profession is easy. If you really want to get noticed, be a man in this ring.” I’m sure Samuray del Sol will have something to say about this.
JON DAVIS VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO- AWESOME!
We got build to both tonight’s Finlay vs. Davis match and tomorrow night’s Davis vs. Low Ki match, all while giving us some great insight into Davis’ character. He is the “quiet, respectful” kind of guy, until he feels disrespected. Now that he feels disrespected by Finlay and Low Ki, he is wondering if he himself has been showing his opponents too much respect.

DAVE FINLAY(2-0) vs. JON DAVIS(1-1)- 7.5/10
Lenny Leonard told us that these two had an “altercation” backstage earlier tonight, but we’ll have to go to the YouTube page to see it.
Each guy worked a limb the match built well, but it felt to me like it never quite got into that final gear. Finlay getting the win with a Tombstone Piledriver also felt a little weird when all of the work had been on the limbs. Lenny Leonard thought there might have been an accidental low blow by Finlay towards the end, but it didn’t look that way to me and I don’t think Davis really sold it that way, either.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- fine
Lenny Leonard interviewed Finlay. He put Davis over big, then pivoted to Sami Callihan, who he said could be a champion anywhere in the world if he got his head out of his ass. Callihan came out and told Finlay to mind his own business. Sami left, and Finlay continued to make his point.

WINNER’S TEAM PICKS THE STIPULATION IN THE NEXT JOHNNY GARGANO VS. CHUCK TAYLOR MATCH: Johnny Gargano & Samuray del Sol vs. Silas Young & Chuck Taylor (w/Jake Manning & the Swamp Monster)- 7.5/10
This was a “pick your partner” tag team match, and as a result, it didn’t count towards the records because these weren’t official tag teams.
Gargano offered Silas a handshake but Silas attacked him because Silas blames Johnny for making him fall off the wagon. The match was full great action. Taylor’s team won when he pinned Johnny Gargano clean in the middle of the ring.

LENNY LEONARD INTERVIEWS CHUCK TAYLOR- good
The stipulation Chuck wants is… that the DGUSA Open the Freedom Gate Title be on the line. A little anti-climactic, considering that he probably could have gotten that anyway just from having pinned Johnny here, but whatever. Also, the match will take place on the next set of DGUSA shows instead of in EVOLVE. This has mostly been a DGUSA storyline, so I guess that is to be expected.

ALEX REYNOLDS PROMO- This was passable, but just barely. He says people are getting to know him now, and tells us that “3-0 is just around the corner.”

EL GENERICO(0-1) vs. RICOCHET(3-2)- 8.25/10
Low Ki was on commentary for this match. Apparently his goal is to get everyone to take themselves more seriously. Also, he wants to get EVOLVE to create a championship. He criticized the wrestlers for not following up on moves quickly enough. This was the excellent athletic match that you would expect.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good
Lenny Leonard interviews Ricochet, who challenges Low Ki to a match. Ki accepts, warning Ricochet not to bite off more than he can chew. Ricochet left, at which point Ki cut another promo on El Generico, who was still seated in the corner, selling his ribs. Ki tells Generico that if he doesn’t shape up and get better, he will become a disgrace to masked wrestlers everywhere. That last part was a little corny, but it’s possible that Ki was just trying to get into Generico’s head rather than actually believing that Generico will be a disgraced to masked wrestlers everywhere.


EVOLUTION’S END: A.R. Fox(2-1) vs. Sami Callihan(3-4)- 8.5/10
Lenny Leonard let us know that those people watching live could go the website after the show and vote on which match they thought was the best, and that match would be given the honor of being in the show title after the colon. As you can tell, this match won, so my expectations are high.
The rules here are that inside the ring, it’s regular EVOLVE rules, but outside of the ring, anything goes. That sounds wacky, but these two did a great job and made it work, making sure that never lost their intensity and violence level even when they went inside the ring and away from the weapons.
Fox picked up the big win here in EVOLVE first real weapons match and won the feud, which was definitely the right call, as he is the less-established guy (and, as we would see, was a guy Gabe would go on to build EVOLVE around and would make feel like one of EVOLVE’s first home-grown stars.

LENNY LEONARD INTERVIEWS A.R. FOX- good
Fox says he is going to win take this momentum forward and win the DGUSA Open the Freedom Gate Title tomorrow.

EL GENERICO INTERVIEW- good
He is asked whether he has anything to say about Low Ki’s comments earlier. He sits there, clearly bothered, and eventually says “no. Nothing,” and walks off.

SAMI CALLIHAN PROMO- excellent!
“Fox, I still hate your guys, but I’ll give you your due!”
Other than that, Sami spent this whole time pretty much talking to himself, wondering if maybe Finally was right. He decided that he needed to focus on tomorrow night’s match against El Generico, but clearly he can’t do that.


This was an excellent show from EVOLVE. The six-match format with one or two preliminaries and then a whole slew of main events worked wonderfully, and after the disruptions of first so much of the talent they had been building around leaving to either ROH, TNA, or WWE, and then taking such big breaks between shows, it feels like storylines are getting back into swing again. I’m quite excited for Evolve 13.